


Tribeca

by superangsty



Category: Succession (TV 2018)
Genre: M/M, bro idk... toms getting a divorce and he's depressed about it what can i say, post s2 fic, tom can have a few panic attacks and ignore them all. as a treat, very little description of actual business bc i dont know anything about business
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-24
Updated: 2021-01-24
Packaged: 2021-03-16 12:55:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,612
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28956801
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/superangsty/pseuds/superangsty
Summary: Sure, he doesn’t like that it’s the middle of the night and instead of going home with his wife or to a hotel suite with room service he’s going to visit cousin fucking Greg but what he really, really doesn’t like is that this isn’t even the first time it’s happened.Tom gets back from Croatia angry and heartbroken. The only place he can think to go to is Greg's.
Relationships: Greg Hirsch/Tom Wambsgans
Comments: 11
Kudos: 50





	Tribeca

**Author's Note:**

> ooohhhh boy this is a lot longer than I anticipated. A lot more rambling too. I thought I could pump a quick one-shot out in a day but instead it's been a week and I've got... this. Bon appetit, I guess

Tom would never dream of admitting it out loud, but there are a lot of things he doesn’t like about New York City. He doesn’t like that it’s never really dark, that there are always lit-up windows and neon signs, he doesn’t like that it’s never really _quiet_ , that when he’s walking through the streets at 3 a.m. a pin could drop and not even the rat it dropped on would hear it over the bustle of the city. He doesn’t like that when its ninety degrees out and the sun is bouncing off the skyscrapers he can’t just crack a window and enjoy the breeze, because the penthouse he and Shiv share – shared? – doesn’t really _have_ windows, they’re more like glass walls that would barely chip if you shot them point blank and besides, they have air conditioning anyway. He misses lakes, and open spaces, and opening his front door with an actual _key_ instead of a series of cards and passcodes. He misses bars and restaurants where jeans and a polo shirt are considered ‘formal’, he misses cooking for himself and sometimes, when the staff are getting on his last nerves, he even misses cleaning.

He misses driving. He doesn’t like that when they land in New York in the middle of the night there’s a separate car waiting for him, one that Shiv won’t get into because she wants him to go to a hotel. He doesn’t like the look the driver gives him when he asks to be taken not to the Plaza or the Four Seasons but to an apartment building in Tribeca and he doesn’t like that the driver knows exactly who lives there because he’s driven him there before and sure, he doesn’t like that it’s the middle of the night and instead of going home with his wife or to a hotel suite with room service he’s going to visit cousin _fucking_ Greg but what he really, _really_ doesn’t like is that this isn’t even the first time it’s happened.

He doesn’t call ahead, he doesn’t even ring the buzzer because the doorman recognises him and lets him up, so he’s not sure why he’s surprised that when he raps on the door it doesn’t open right away.

It actually takes a couple of minutes, and a few more rounds of increasingly impatient knocking, before the door swings open to reveal Greg. His hair is mussed from sleep and his eyes are bleary, there’s a t-shirt riding up his torso that he must have just pulled on because it’s inside out and the label’s at the front (and The Gap? Really? Any other day, Tom would tease him for that).

“What the fuck, Tom?”

Tom raises his eyebrows. “Shouldn’t that be _my_ line?”

“Can we, like, do this tomorrow?” asks Greg, wiping a hand over his face. “It’s just, I mean I don’t know what time it is? But I was just asleep, and I’ve had a long day so –”

“Oh, you’ve had a long day?” Tom steps forward, uninvited, crossing the threshold of Greg’s apartment. “ _You’ve_ had a long day, huh? Running around being Kendall’s little accessory to murder really takes it out of a guy, does it?”

“Dude, I mean – I don’t think you should say that. Nobody – nobody’s going to die just because we exposed a few – a few white collar crimes.”

Greg looks so small, in this huge loft, lit up only by the moon and the buildings outside. His whole body is tense and he’s hunched over, looking at his hands as he methodically clicks each finger.

“Except for me, Greg, I am. You’ve killed me.” He takes a step closer to Greg. Greg stumbles back.

“Wha—”

“You just stabbed me in the back on live television, and now I’m _dead_ , Greg,” Tom continues, his voice slowly rising, “and you couldn’t even send me a fucking apology text!”

“Tom,” Greg says, and his voice is clear and steady like he wasn’t just asleep a few minutes ago. He reaches out, puts a firm hand on each of Tom’s shoulders. “You need to go home, and get some sleep, and we can talk about this in the morning.”

“Except I _can’t_ , in fact, go home.” Tom feels – something, he doesn’t know. Anger or misery or regret or relief but whatever it is it forces a laugh through his chest, makes his face split into a grin. “I can’t go home, _Greg_ , because I don’t have a home anymore. It’s all _fucked_.”

Greg blinks, and for a moment he just stands there, staring at Tom. Then he drops his arms and sighs.

“I’ll go make us some coffee.”

*

Tom almost wishes that Greg’s apartment wasn’t quite so open plan, that while he paced back and forth past the couch that he didn’t also have to watch Greg fumble about in the kitchen, the spotlights in the ceiling making him seem pale and ghost-like. It’s too quiet, is the thing. He feels like there should be music, or the TV should be on, or like they should be talking to each other but instead there’s just the sound of Tom’s footsteps and the mugs clashing against each other as Greg pulls them out of the cabinet.

After an eternity of that, Greg walks over and hands a coffee to Tom, then goes to sit on the couch. Tom sits – or maybe it’s more of a perch, he’s so close to the edge of the seat – at the opposite end, staring into his cup, listening to Greg anxiously tap his foot.

“I’m waiting for you to explain yourself, Greg,” he says slowly, still keeping his gaze fixed on the coffee.

“Right, um.” Greg takes a swig of his coffee, then mutters a curse when he burns his tongue. “I feel like it’s, like, pretty self-explanatory? What I did?”

“And yet here I am, asking for an explanation.” Tom looks at him, at this dumb kid who may have just helped bring down a multi-billion dollar company, and he wishes he had never married Shiv because _Jesus Christ, this fucking family._ “Because I _saw_ you burn those documents, and now Kendall’s waving them around in front of the press.”

“It was going to be you, you asshole! It was going to be _you_ , with me and my little fucking – Greg sprinkles on top, and I _knew_ something like this would happen and I knew I’d need protection!” Greg slams his cup down, spilling onto the coffee table, and he stands up, walking over to look out the window instead of at Tom, hands on his hips. He turns back almost immediately, jaw clenched. “So, yeah, when Kendall came and asked me if I still had the documents I handed them over, because I thought that maybe if we killed Logan then nothing would happen to _you_.”

He comes back to the couch, collapses onto it and buries his face in his hands. “You _dick_ ,” he mutters. Tom feels like maybe he should pat him on the shoulder, or something, but he doesn’t. He just keeps staring.

“Those documents,” Tom says, his voice still slow and even and, in all likelihood, patronising as hell. “Those documents are proof that I lied, in a court of _fucking_ law, Greg.”

Greg looks up at him, eyes shining. “But you didn’t, though,” he says. “I checked the court records. A while ago, I checked them, and you were an asshole but you didn’t lie. You’re clean.”

“And you? Are _you_ ‘clean’?”

“Right.” Greg huffs, a weak attempt at a laugh. “Like you care. You’ve wanted me dead from the start.”

He’s right, of course, but it still makes Tom’s chest clench. To have it put out there so plainly that this guy, maybe the only person Tom can actually call a friend, knows he was always just meant to be collateral. Maybe it’s guilt, maybe it’s residual anger over this whole shitshow but he feels like he’s gonna be sick.

Instead, he shuffles forward on the couch, closer to Greg. He puts a hand on Greg’s knee and just leaves it there, a heavy, slightly uncomfortable weight between them. “Greg. Are you going to be alright.”

Greg looks at Tom’s hand, looks back up into his eyes. “Yeah. You’re right, I come out looking pretty bad in all this, but like, it’s fine. Kendall said he’d look after me, and after my hearing the whole world thinks I’m an idiot anyway, so…”

Tom’s hand, of its own free will, tightens to squeeze Greg’s knee. “Told you playing dumb would work.”

“Yeah,” Greg says, that awkward half-laugh half-sob back again, and he hastily rubs a hand over his eyes.

They sit like that for a few moments, probably less than a minute but it feels like hours, Tom staring at his hand and wondering if he should move it, if he’s being inappropriate, and Greg staring straight ahead at a spot on the wall.

It’s Greg who eventually breaks the silence. “I’ll take care of you, Tom,” he says, and now it just feels awkward, it feels wrong so Tom lets his hand slide off Greg’s leg, lets it fall slack on the couch. “I’ll protect you from – from the fallout, if you ask me to.”

“Right. Because you’re so important.”

Greg locks eyes with him. Tom wants to run away right about now. “Only if you ask. You have to ask.”

“Greg, I –”

“Think on it,” Greg says, dropping his hand down onto Tom’s, just for a second, before standing up. “I’m going back to bed. You can take the couch for tonight.”

*

Tom wakes up, rolls over, and immediately hits the floor. Right. The couch.

He doesn’t normally feel groggy when he wakes up, but he’s still on Croatia time, and he was only ever going to get a couple hours sleep anyway, since his phone is programmed to buzz him awake at 6.

He wonders if Shiv is awake. If the alarm woke her and now she’s staring wistfully at his empty side of the bed, wondering if she should call. He wonders who she’s going to choose, if she’ll get in the car and ask to be taken to Kendall’s or Logan’s, or if she’ll wait to see which one makes her an offer first and instead go to her lawyer to start the divorce proceedings.

This is something he could fix, if he wanted to. He could call, ask to meet her in a public place and he could tell her that he wasn’t thinking straight, the other day. That the pressure of being under fire got to him, that of course he’s happy because how could he _not_ be happy when he’s married to the woman of his dreams, and even though it’s been killing him he could tell her that he’s fine with the open relationship thing, that she can fuck as many guys as she wants so long as she comes home to him at the end of the day. And Shiv would probably accept that. She’d pull Tom into an awkward hug, because the Roys don’t really Do hugs but she hates kissing him in public, and they’d go home together and he could see his dog and not have to fight for himself ever again.

Maybe he should. He really does love her, there’s no absence of affection there, at least not from his side. And it’s not the worst thing in the world, to always be just a little bit miserable. There are pills for that. There are expensive therapists. And, of course, being with Shiv was always going to give him more protection than whatever _cousin Greg_ was trying to offer. Even if her whole family hated him, they’d keep him safe because hurting him would hurt her.

He should call her, but he doesn’t. Instead, he calls the front desk of their building, asks if she’s in, and they tell him she’s not, because of _course_ she’s not, that would make too much sense. So he folds up the blanket he’d slept under and quietly goes downstairs to hail a cab, and he goes to the dogsitter’s to collect his dog and then he goes to his beautiful fucking penthouse and stuffs some clothes into a bag, slings it over his shoulder, and leaves.

He takes Mondale to City Hall Park and lets him off the leash so he can run around for a bit while Tom sits on a bench and drinks some disgusting coffee he paid a dollar for at a cart down the street. For a while he just sits there, watching the joggers and the dog walkers and the snivelling little PAs all trying to get to work before their bosses, but eventually Mondale gets bored and starts whining at him to make a move, take him somewhere more exciting.

There isn’t really anywhere to go, though. Tom had realised somewhere between his apartment and the park that no hotel would let him in with a dog, no matter how much he paid them, and it’s not like he has all that many friends in the city he could crash with while he apartment-hunts. Which means he has to go back to Greg’s, pathetic though that makes him.

He doesn’t have to go back straight away, because it’s just barely 7 a.m. and in all the time Tom’s known him he’s never seen Greg out and about before 9. Instead, he wanders over to Whole Foods, argues with the guy at the door until he lets Mondale in too, and he fills a basket with breakfast fixings, then he goes out and finds a decent looking coffee shop near Greg’s building, orders two vanilla lattes because that’s what he feels like and really who the fuck cares what Greg’s coffee order is anyway, and then, finally, he heads back up to the apartment and knocks on the door for the second time in six hours.

This time he doesn’t have to wait long for an answer, though, because the door swings open after the first knock and there’s Greg, looking despondent in slippers and a robe.

Greg just stares at him for a few seconds, eyes wide.

“Uh,” Tom says with a frown, “hi?”

“Hi.”

“May I… come in?” he asks. Greg doesn’t move.

“I thought you’d left,” Greg says, finally stepping aside to let Tom in. “I was worried.”

Mondale trots in ahead of him and immediately jumps up onto the couch, settling down there. Greg looks at him, points, then looks back at Tom, frowning. ‘Mondale’, he murmurs, not really a question or directed at Tom at all, just like he was confirming to himself what he was seeing.

Tom holds out one of the coffees and Greg takes it, still frowning in confusion. He follows Tom through to the kitchen and watches as he unpacks the groceries from the paper bag, setting them up ready to cook.

“Where do you keep your pans?” Tom asks, already rummaging through the drawers to find the tools he needs.

“My pans?”

Tom raises his eyebrows and waits, feeling like he can actually _see_ the cogs turning in Greg’s mind.

“Oh! Um, lower cabinet to your right.”

Tom takes a couple of pans out – Le Creuset, very nice and clearly never used – and sticks them on the stovetop to start cooking. He motions for Greg to sit on one of the kitchen stools, knowing better than to ask if he would help with the cooking.

He starts cooking, and this time the silence that falls over them feels comfortable, lived in. Maybe it’s the cooking. Tom’s always been happiest when he’s cooking for other people. That’s another reason he’d thought, at the start of their relationship, that Shiv was perfect for him: she likes being cooked for. Of course, he quickly found out that was only true when the people cooking for her were faceless, nameless people whose paychecks she signed, not the man she was sleeping with.

He serves up a plate and passes it to Greg, then finds a side-plate and puts a rasher of bacon on it for Mondale before sitting down with his own breakfast. Greg shovels the food into his mouth like he’s starving, like he hasn’t eaten in years, and he’s done before Tom’s even halfway through.

“So did you go speak to Shiv?” he asks, and Tom almost chokes on the toast he was chewing. “I know you – I mean, I don’t know, like, exactly what’s going on, but you seemed pretty upset last night. This morning. I – before. You seemed pretty upset before.”

Tom turns to look at him. He seems genuinely concerned, the freak, and if Tom were anyone else maybe he’d be having a heart to heart right now. “I was upset, Greg, because as we’ve discussed you had just _killed me_ on live television.”

“Right,” Greg says, nodding like he thinks Tom’s being rational (where’s the _fight_ , dammit, this is no fun). “But, like, did you speak to her?”

Tom takes a bite of his breakfast, chews it slowly to delay answering. “No,” he says, “she wasn’t home. I just went to get some stuff, I can’t wear my _boat clothes_ now that I’m back in the city.”

“Right,” Greg says again, and he nods again and boy is _that_ getting annoying fast. “So you’re staying here, then?”

“Certainly seems that way,” Tom says brightly, raising his eyebrows.

“Right.”

“Right.”

“And, uh, I don’t want to like, sour the mood? But did you think about – I mean, is there anything you wanted to ask me?”

“Not right now, Greg.”

“But later?”

“We’ll see.”

*

Greg has to go into work – or, well, not _work_ , but he has to go to meetings with Kendall, apparently, because staging a coup these days requires a lot of diplomacy. Tom is aware that he should be going into the office himself, that it’ll be all hands on deck and he needs to show up and be Visible to show that hey, he may not be married into the family for much longer but he still has his uses, but he can’t find it in himself to give a shit. Maybe he’s just tired of the fact that no matter what side he’s on he always ends up losing.

So anyway, Greg isn’t home and Tom’s left to bounce around the apartment on his own all day. He goes down to the resident’s gym, runs for an hour on the treadmill because he didn’t get the chance to go on his morning run and what kind of freak would be seen running on the streets in the middle of the day? He takes Mondale on two walks, exploring the neighbourhood, and he buys himself some epsom salts and essential oils and sits in the bath until the steam makes him dizzy.

Mostly he just thinks.

He doesn’t get any texts or calls from Shiv, he doesn’t get any texts or calls from _anyone_. Not even his assistant emails to ask where he is and isn’t it sad that that’s the one that stings the most? His life is falling apart and he’s just sitting around losing at Smash Bros on Greg’s Nintendo.

He considers going back to Minnesota, briefly. If he gets the divorce settlement he’s expecting, that plus his savings would be enough to buy himself a _very_ nice house out there, nicer even than the five bedroom he grew up in, and he’d probably have enough left over to support himself on a comfortable middle class lifestyle for life. His parents would like that he’s home. Mondale would like having a garden. He could get involved, make friends with the locals, maybe a few years down the line meet a nice single mom whose kids are in need of a dad, and that’d be it. He’d be sorted. He’d maybe even be happy, or at least content.

He also considers moving to a different city, one that’s not New York or Washington where everyone knows his name and face. Maybe Boston, or Seattle. If he pays someone to help clean up his online image, with a resume like his he could get an executive position anywhere. He could have almost exactly the same life that he has in New York, just not as special and sparkly.

Obviously, though, Tom is never gonna leave New York. It’s like Hotel California, once you’ve gotten there you can’t ever really get out.

That’s a great song, actually, he thinks. He asks the Alexa to play it and he’s listening to the third repeat when Greg gets back.

“Hey, man,” greets Greg, with that awkward little wave he does. “I got you a bagel, just, in case you were hungry?”

“Oh. Uh, thanks.” Tom isn’t hungry, he ate a good lunch and it’s too early to be thinking about dinner, but he accepts it anyway. It’s surprisingly good; he can’t actually remember the last time he ate a proper New York bagel.

Greg comes to sit down with him, turning down the speakers so the music is just background noise. “Um, I don’t know if you had any, like, plans for tonight, but I was gonna just stay in, if that’s cool?”

Tom doesn’t have any plans for that night, or for tomorrow night, or for any night ever again for the rest of his life, but Greg doesn’t need to know that. He glances at him, briefly, then looks back at a spot in the distance. “Yeah man, that’s cool.”

“It’s just that the press have kinda been hounding me, ha, and I wouldn’t want to – to put you in an uncomfortable position, being spotted with the traitor.” He chuckles, tucking some hair behind his ear.

“It’s _cool_ , Greg,” Tom says, sighing. “And I mean, better you than Kendall, right?”

“Hah. Yeah.”

And because Tom is nosy, because he’s built his life on getting involved in other people’s business: “how’s he doing, anyway?”

Greg’s face falls. “Oh. I don’t, uh, I think maybe I shouldn’t be, like, disclosing that? To you?”

“You don’t trust me?”

He knows that whatever comes out of Greg’s mouth next won’t be no, but that it’ll mean no anyway. Tom has spent the past year and a bit trying to make it explicitly clear that while sure, Greg can _maybe_ trust him more than the Roys, that doesn’t really mean anything at all, and that trusting Tom with anything more secret than his middle name would be a big mistake.

And yet, for the past year and a bit, every time Greg’s come to Tom with a secret he’s kept it for him.

“I, um. I do, actually,” Greg says, eyes darting down to his clasped hands. “But I signed an NDA, so.”

This is the perfect time for Tom to bring up the elephant in the room, the one that’s been sitting between them all day. He could say sure, but once I’m in it won’t matter anymore, we’ll have the same secrets. He could say he’s always believed in Kendall, always thought he should be the one running the company and it’d be an honour to help him achieve that. He could say actually, Greg, I don’t care, because you’re a pathetic fucking nobody who was in the right place at the right time and I need your protection about as much as I need a subway pass.

Instead, he says: “should we open a bottle of wine?”

Greg nods in agreement and gets up to find a bottle. The one he comes out with isn’t great, some Whole Foods organic $50 bullshit, but at least it doesn’t come in a box. When Greg comes back to the couch and hands him a glass Tom swirls it around for a second and sniffs it; it smells like – well, like wine. He’s never been able to tell much difference beyond ‘is it red or white’ and ‘is it so cheap that the acidity is burning my nostrils’, and this one doesn’t smell _bad_ , but he pulls a face anyway, asks if Greg had picked it out of a dumpster.

He finishes about half of his glass in silence before he feels ready enough to look down at the wine swishing in his glass, sigh, and say “about what you said last night.”

“Oh,” says Greg, before taking a long swig of his wine. “Oh. Yeah. That.”

“You have to understand, Greg, that I am…” Terrified this will turn around and kill him after all. Furious that Greg lied to him for so long about the papers. Heartbroken and very aware that this will be the final nail in the coffin for his marriage. “…reluctant. To give up what little power over you I still have.”

He doesn’t look up, though he feels Greg’s eyes on him. Greg doesn’t say anything, he hums and haws, fumbling for words for a few seconds before giving up.

Tom starts tapping the side of his glass. “And I know that makes me an asshole, but it’s just –” He’s still hunched over but he turns his head, meets Greg’s eyes. “It’s just that I’m tired of being burned, and you could really hurt me here, you know?”

“I wouldn’t,” Greg says, forcefully. His eyes are almost comically wide but they’re steady and serious, fixed on Tom’s like there’s nothing else in the room. For one short, fleeting moment, Tom feels the urge to shuffle forward, to lean in closer. He ignores it. “I wouldn’t.”

“So I guess the only other thing I need to know,” Tom starts, even though he already knows he’s going to say yes, he’s known all day, “is what you’re _actually_ offering me here. Is this just an ‘I’ll keep you out of prison’ kind of deal or is there a job for me, at fucking – kenstar gregco?”

“There’s – there’ll be a job for you. If we win. _If._ You’ll stay an executive, maybe move up a bit, ‘cause I think Kendall needs people he can trust.”

“Kendall _trusts_ me?”

Greg smirks and looks away, shrugging. “When I asked, like, ‘hey, what about Tom?’ he said ‘I like Tom’ so I think – I think yeah?”

“Okay,” Tom says. Okay. Time to swallow his pride and save himself from drowning.

“Okay?”

“Yeah, Greg. This is me, asking you to take care of me.”

Greg smiles, then, his whole face splitting with it, and he leans forward for one of those awkward hugs of his, arms folded uncomfortably around a Tom who doesn’t move at all.

He pulls away, still smiling, and finishes his wine. “I’ll talk to Kendall tomorrow.”

*

Nothing happens straight away. For two weeks, Tom hangs around Greg’s apartment, only really leaving to get groceries or walk the dog. He orders a bed for one of Greg’s depressingly unfurnished spare bedrooms and hovers awkwardly while the people put it together for him. He thinks about reading the books on his to-read list but instead discovers a love of daytime television. He gets slightly less terrible at Smash Bros (he likes playing as the little yellow dog).

After two weeks, he gets his first phone call that’s not Greg asking him to pick up more milk while he’s out. It’s his mom.

Their conversation is short, and goes something like this:

_His mom: Honey, I just got a letter from Shiv’s lawyers  
Tom: That was quicker than I expected  
His mom: Why didn’t you tell us you and Shiv were having trouble?  
Tom: It didn’t come up  
His mom: We’re worried about you  
Tom: Don’t be  
His mom: Maybe you should come home for a while  
Tom: I have responsibilities here  
His mom: Are you staying with someone?  
Tom: Yes  
His mom: Who?  
Tom: What did Shiv’s lawyers say?  
His mom: [sighs] It’s very fair terms, if you want out quickly I think you should sign it  
Tom: Fine. Courier it over  
His mom: Okay. But how are you doing?  
Tom: Bye, mom_

He hangs up before he has to listen to her say ‘I love you’, then he leans back in his chair, picks up a pillow, and screams into it.

Mondale wanders over and starts sniffing at him, vaguely curious in the unconcerned way dogs tend to be when they hear someone in distress, and he pulls him up onto his lap, fingers curled tightly in his fur.

Maybe a couple of tears end up in Mondale’s brown curls, but nobody’s there to see it and dogs dry quickly, anyway.

But Jesus fucking Christ. Two weeks, and he’s already being served divorce papers. He could try to justify it, tell himself that maybe Shiv’s trying to be kind in her own twisted way, letting him out as quickly and painlessly as possible so that they can move on and act like the last four years of his life never happened, but he’s feeling far too pissed off and betrayed to give her that benefit of the doubt. All he can think is how she hasn’t even fucking _called_.

He lets himself sit and wallow in his own misery for a while, then he roughly wipes the tears from his face and he gets up and goes to the bathroom and splashes himself with cold water. He looks in the mirror, forces a smile, and then he goes back out and picks up his phone. He calls up the trendy new pop-up restaurant a few blocks from the apartment, drops Greg’s name (and since when was _that_ enough to get you bumped up the guestlist?), and he goes to his room and puts on a suit for the first time in two weeks.

He waits an hour on the couch for Greg to come back, hands folded neatly in his lap, no music or TV playing so that when Greg _does_ get back he can easily jump up with a smile, clap his hands together, and say “Greg! You and I are going out tonight, buddy.”

Greg reels back slightly, like he’s watching a horror movie and there’s just been a jump-scare. He frowns slightly with a small, confused smile, one hand raised in a delayed greeting. “Okay?”

Tom keeps the smile plastered on. “Do you wanna get changed?”

“Um.” Greg looks down at himself like he’s expecting to find a huge coffee stain there. “Do I _need_ to get changed?”

He doesn’t, really. He looks good. His navy suit is tailored perfectly, achieving the impossible feat of making him look less like a noodle and more like a human man, and his hair is still neat - maybe Tom should be asking what gel he uses because it looks _really_ good – and his thoughts are veering off topic, never mind. He’s not wearing a tie, a trend that works for some but that Tom could never get behind, but it doesn’t really matter what he’s wearing anyway because no restaurant in their right mind would turn away the guy who’s been plastered all over the business pages for two weeks.

“No,” Tom says, and it comes out softer than he’d intended. “You look good.” Fuck. Fine. He looks _fine_ , who says ‘you look good’?

“Oh,” says Greg.

“So should we, um…” Tom trails off, gesturing at the door instead.

“Oh,” Greg repeats. “Sure, let’s…”

Tom doesn’t know if it’s the change from their usual routine of ‘sitting in front of the TV eating whatever Tom felt like cooking that day’, or if it’s the nervous anticipation of actually spending an evening out in public, but the actual act of getting out of the apartment, downstairs, and onto the street is one of the most excruciatingly awkward experiences of his life. It’s all ‘after you’ and ‘no, please, after _you_ ’, and ‘should we call a dogsitter? Did I remember my ID? Do you think we should call a car?’, and not much actual _leaving_.

But, once they’re walking down the street it gets easier. Greg still looks awkward, his hands shoved in his pockets which is probably creasing his trousers to hell, but Tom doesn’t comment. They keep up a steady stream of chatter, mindless ‘how was your day’ shit and Tom very carefully doesn’t mention the call from his mother. No need to spoil the evening’s mood.

When they get to the restaurant Greg asks what the special is, well-trained little rich boy that he is, and the waitress looks at him funny and tells him it’s a tasting menu, which Tom knew but thought it had seemed to obvious to mention. Greg scowls, sees Tom’s glare, and rearranges his face into a polite smile.

“Tom?” Greg asks, sometime after their fifth course but before dessert, “not that I don’t, like, appreciate this? But why are we out tonight?”

“Can’t a guy take his buddy out for dinner and dancing anymore?”

“Right, sure,” says Greg. He tucks some hair behind his ear; a nervous tic he does often enough to be irritating but when combined with the restaurant setting is suddenly giving Tom flashbacks to the first time they did this ( _‘are you trying to seduce me?’ ‘yes I am’_ ). “It’s just that, uh, the only times we do this are when you’re upset about something, so.”

It stings that Greg thinks that Tom thinks so little of him, but it maybe stings even more that he’s not actually wrong. Tom is the biggest asshole in the universe. He knows this about himself, he hates this about himself. He knows that Greg, especially, gets the brunt of this, and just like everything else in Tom’s life, he knows that this is something he could fix.

He could apologise and tell Greg that he’s his best friend in the city, his best friend period. He could tell Greg that he’d honestly rather be sitting on the couch watching soap operas with him but that sometimes the only way he can chase away the sad is going out and spending an obscene amount of money to remind everyone that he’s better than them. He could tell him the truth, that tomorrow a bike messenger’s gonna show up with a manila envelope that’ll turn him into a divorcee and that he just wants to delay that for as long as possible.

Maybe for once he should give it a go, try saying what he actually means.

“I will officially be a bachelor by the end of this week,” he says, which is the closest he’s ever gonna get. “So I thought I should. Practice. The bachelor lifestyle. Get my hours in.”

“Tom…”

“You remember that club we went to once? With the gold leaf vodka?” Tom asks, smiling and pretending he can’t see the pitying look Greg’s shooting him. “That was, um, _lit_. We should go there tonight.”

*

The club is only okay. Tom had never liked clubbing before he was rich; the packed rooms of sweating bodies dancing to ear-splitting music and drinking cheap booze just wasn’t his thing, and after he was rich the music was still bad but at least he could get a private section and overpriced bottle service. Greg doesn’t talk much about his life before New York, or maybe Tom just doesn’t ask, but he seems like a mosh pit, rave party kinda guy. He always looks uncomfortable when it’s just a few of them up on a balcony, away from the commoners.

Tom gets too drunk. He orders a whole bottle of that stupid vodka again, like he hadn’t learnt his lesson last time, and he hands shots out to the few people who are in the VIP section with them, and Greg has two, maybe three for himself. The rest, Tom finishes.

So Greg is a little more upright when they stumble back into the apartment in the early hours of the morning, and Tom is taking advantage of that to lean heavily on him. He’s having the time of his life, actually – once the door is shut behind them he keeps up his singing, dancing along with himself. He grabs Greg by the arm, tries to pull him in to dance too, but when he blinks up at Greg’s face he realises he looks fucking miserable.

“Greg?”

Greg sighs, runs a hand over his face. “Yeah, Tom?”

“What’s up, buddy?”

“Nothing.” Greg pats him on the arm, gives him a weak smile as if to say ‘look, see, I’m having a great time’. “It’s nothing. I’m gonna get us some water.”

He goes to the kitchen and gets out two pint glasses, filling them with water straight from the tap (gross, Tom thinks, there’s mineral water just in the fridge). Tom wanders over while he does that, coming to sit on one of the kitchen stools.

“You got any chips?” he asks, and as if by magic a bag of chips is thrown to him, sliding across the counter until it hits his hands. He sits and eats a few for a while, watching Greg sip at his water.

He watches Greg. He watches Greg watching him. There’s something in his eyes that makes Tom feel like his insides are deflating, his systems are shutting down. “Is it me? Is it something I did?”

“No,” Greg says, but he’s replied too fast, so that it’s almost overlapping Tom’s words. He watches Tom watching him. “I mean, yes. But it’s not –” he waves a hand, “who cares, y’know?”

“Am I being a downer? Did bringing up my divorce kill the mood? Do I make you uncomfortable? Do I kill your street cred? Am I ‘cringe’? Did I cockblock you? Have I overstayed my welcome? Did I –”

“ _Tom_ ,” Greg cuts in, and Tom’s spinning head comes to an abrupt halt. “You’re pretty wasted, huh?”

Tom reaches across the counter and pats Greg’s hand. “Not too wasted to care about my buddy!” He smiles, eats another chip. “Really, what is it. Maybe I can help.”

Greg downs the last of his water, then goes to refill his glass. His hands are trembling. Maybe this is really serious, Tom thinks. Maybe he shouldn’t be drunk. Maybe he _had_ to be drunk for it to come up at all.

“When I was a kid,” Greg starts, a million years later, “I used to mess stuff up a lot. I guess I’d get bored, or like, too excited, and I’d do something stupid. And my mom would always say, y’know, ‘hey Greg, there’s a time and a place for everything’, right?”

Hey, that’s good advice. Tom points at Greg. “That’s good advice.”

Greg gives him a single chuckle in response, then looks down into his glass. “And I think. I think that here and now is maybe the _wrong_ time and place, but today was weird and I guess I’m kind of at the end of my rope, here? And I feel like if I don’t say something to you I might explode?”

Tom doesn’t say anything this time. He just eats another chip and keeps on looking at Greg, waiting for him to look back at him or say something more. Preferably both.

Greg doesn’t look up.

“I’m sorry you’re getting a divorce. Or like, I’m sorry that you’re sad about it. But I think…” And here, finally, he looks at Tom. “I don’t think you should have been with Shiv to begin with.”

Everything freezes. Tom’s blood turns to shards of ice, and suddenly he feels stone cold sober. “You’re wrong. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I’m sure that she loved you, like, in her own way? But I think that the way my cousins view love is different to the way normal people do, they’re so high up on fucking – mount Olympus, that the – the love and devotion of one mortal guy barely pings their radar.”

Tom blinks. “So I wasn’t _good enough_ for her? Is that what you’re saying?”

“No, fuck, this is coming out wrong,” Greg says, raking a hand through his hair. “I’m saying that _she’s_ not good enough for _you._ I’m saying that I think you put so much of yourself into everything you do and I think you’re attentive and caring and I think you have so much more love to give than someone like Shiv knows what to do with and I think I was _right_ , that she cheated on you and even though she’s my cousin and I love and respect her I _think_ , I think that, like, maybe she’s not worthy. Of you.”

“And who, pray tell, _is_ worthy, Greg,” Tom says, cold and vicious and okay, maybe he’s still drunk but that all still sounds like the biggest load of shit he’s ever heard, “of such an almighty _fucking_ gift, huh?”

“Me.”

*

Tom wakes up with the taste of stale booze in his mouth, a hangover the size of Texas, and the memory of his and Greg’s conversation spinning round in his head. What the fuck _was_ that?

He stumbles out of bed and into the kitchen, uses a pod to make himself a coffee because even though he prefers using the French press he can’t bear to wait that long. He finishes one cup, starts a second, and waits for Greg to walk in.

When he eventually does, tiptoeing around Tom with his eyes wide like he’s scared making the wrong move will land him dead, Tom just smiles and offers him some coffee.

“Last night was crazy,” he says, carefully, “I got so drunk, I don’t remember a thing.”

“Oh?” Some of the tension leaves Greg’s shoulders. “Well, ha, you’re not missing much.”

“Right.”

*

Tom tries his best to forget it. He’s taken enough insults from drunk people over the years to know that alcohol makes you say things you don’t necessarily mean. And it doesn’t matter, anyway, because even if it _did_ mean something it was so stupid and cryptic that it could mean _anything_ , and what the hell can he be expected to do with that?

Not that he _should_ do anything with it, even if it means something and that something is what his brain is screaming at him that it is.

Anyway. He tries to forget it. He goes back to his usual routine, and he doesn’t suggest they go out again. His divorce papers come, and he signs them and sends them back with barely a glance over them. Money appears in his bank account and he shoves it into savings so that he doesn’t have to see the number every time he checks his balance. He ignores the newspapers that get left on the kitchen counter, the one with Kendall’s face splashed all over them, and he ignores his phone. A bomb could go off a block from him and he’s so deliberately out of the loop that he’d probably never know.

Every day, Greg goes to work, and every day Tom has dinner waiting when he gets home, like a perfect fucking 1950s housewife. He walks Mondale so much that he starts feeling guilty that when – if – he goes back to work, that job’ll be handed off to someone else because he won’t have the time.

It’s around 6 in the evening and a week after the night out that there’s a knock at the door. Tom’s still in the kitchen cooking and for a moment his brain stalls. Greg doesn’t get visitors, Tom _definitely_ doesn’t get visitors because the only person he’s spoken to in almost a month _is_ Greg, and it’s too late for a delivery.

Maybe Greg _does_ get visitors, normally, when he’s not got his ex-boss ex-cousin-in-law staying with him, and this is just one of them, and they’ll be expecting to see their friend and will instead get the disappointing image of Tom in the doorway.

Maybe, and it takes embarrassingly long for him to think of this, Greg’s just forgotten his keys.

He turns off the stove and heads to the door, wiping his hands down on his waist apron (Greg had teased him when he bought it, but he is _not_ risking sauce on his $1000 jeans). He’s got a scathing comment ready to go, something about Greg being too dumb to get into his own apartment but said in a way that sounds much cooler and refined, but when he opens the door it’s not Greg he sees but Kendall.

His brain stalls again.

“Hi Tom,” Kendall says, taking a hand out of his pocket to give a little wave.

Tom plasters on a smile. “Kendall!” he says, waving him in, “I wasn’t expecting you, come in!”

Kendall frowns. “You weren’t? Greg said he texted you.”

“Oh.” Would it be weird, to say to Kendall that he hasn’t looked at his phone at _all_ in at least two days? Probably. “My phone must be out of juice. Is he on his way?” At that, Tom peers around Kendall as if he’s somehow hiding all 6’7 of Greg behind him.

“Dude.” Kendall’s got his head cocked to the side now, still with that slightly incredulous frown he gets, like he’s looking at a specimen in a lab. “Seriously?”

“What?” Tom blinks. Clearly, he’s missing something here, and once upon a time he would have probably lied and pretended he knew exactly what they were talking about, but right now he’s thinking if Greg’s not here and he’s somewhere Kendall thinks Tom should know about then what the hell does that mean? Is he at work? Did he go on holiday? Is he – and Tom’s stomach drops at the thought – is he hurt? In hospital?

But Kendall doesn’t look so worried. Though who can say, really, if he _would_ look worried about that.

“It’s his deposition tonight.”

“His deposition?”

Kendall blinks. “For the lawsuit? Against my dad?”

“Oh.” Well, there goes dinner. A shame, really, because Tom had chosen a recipe he thought Greg would like, some kind of cajun chicken thing.

The thought brings Tom to a halt, just for a second. Because why does he care more about a stupid little _dinner_ than he does that Greg apparently didn’t tell him this huge detail? And, in fact, he can still barely bring himself to care that Greg is out right now doing what is objectively an exciting thing, a thing that the old Tom would be dying of jealousy over.

He _does_ care, he reminds himself. He cares about the company. He cares about his future _at_ the company. And he does _not_ care about what Greg thinks of his cooking.

“I just thought that since Greg’s out –” Kendall says, breaking Tom out of his thoughts, “I mean, I’ve been meaning to talk to you anyway, so I thought I’d drop by.”

“Yeah, no, sure.” Tom waves a hand towards the couch. “Make yourself at home, do you want some dinner?”

Kendall stares at him.

“Right. No, of course. A drink?”

“I think maybe we can just sit,” Kendall says, walking ahead of Tom to the couch.

He sits, waits for Tom to sit too, then he looks around like he’s never seen the place before, like he doesn’t _own_ the place. “You certainly seem comfortable here.”

“Oh,” Tom blinks. “Well, yeah. I’m getting used to it, I guess. Ha.”

There’s another extended pause. “Right,” Kendall says, drawing the word out. “Well, look, I’ve not spoken with Shiv so I don’t know the whole story, but I mean. That’s over, right?”

Over. It’s not a word Tom’s been using, really, it’s not one he’s been thinking about. It’s too neat, ties the whole damn mess into one little bow and hits him with it like a ton of bricks. Like it doesn’t matter that his feelings haven’t changed, it doesn’t matter how much it’s all crushing him; his marriage, and by extension his life, is over.

“It’s…” he starts, trying to smile, force a laugh, _something_ so that he doesn’t keel over and start hyperventilating. “It’s all happening very fast.”

Again, that pause and again, Kendall giving him that Look. “…sure,” he says eventually, with the tiniest shake of his head. “And now you’re here. With Greg.”

Well, no, because Greg is at a deposition that Tom hadn’t known about. Right now, and most of the time, he’s alone. “He’s been good to put me up. And, ha, I think my spare room is probably better decorated than the master at this point.”

“Spare –” Kendall starts, then cuts himself off, shaking his head again “Never mind. I just – what I’m saying is that I don’t owe it to Shiv to find you a job, anymore.”

“Oh.”

It’s fine, really. It’s not like Tom thinks he’s _entitled_ to a job, or anything, it’s not like he _actually_ thought Greg would have any sway in that department. He liked working at Waystar Royco. He liked being part of the Roy family, but he’s not either of those things anymore and he’s a grown man, dammit, he can deal with this. There are other jobs. There are other ways to _get_ jobs, though maybe it’s changed a bit since the last time he had to try.

At least his brain has the decency to let him feel disappointed. The indifference was starting to get old.

Kendall shuffles forward, so that he’s on the edge of his seat. “No, Tom, that’s a _good_ thing. I mean that I think you might actually be a decent executive, even without all the fucking – nepotism, or whatever. I want you on my team.”

Tom feels like a blushing girl who’s just been proposed to ( _yes, a thousand times yes!_ ), but he remarkably manages to keep his cool. “Kendall, that’s…”

“How does COO sound?”

“ _Fuck_ ,” Tom says, because he can’t help himself. He was expecting executive, maybe his old job, _definitely_ not c-suite. “Yeah, that sounds. Fuck. Yes.”

Kendall smiles for the first time all evening, only for a second, and Tom just keeps sitting there grinning like a lunatic. COO. _Fuck_.

*

“So Kendall came by today.”

“Yeah, I know,” Greg says, looking at Tom with a frown. “You should really, like, check your phone more.”

“Well I know that _now_ , Greg.”

It had been late when Greg got in, after 11 – those lawyers must be thrilled with all the overtime they’re undoubtedly getting paid – but Tom had waited up anyway, even though he’s more of an early-to-bed, early-to-rise kinda guy. So when Greg walked in, hands full of paperwork (does the man not have a briefcase?), Tom handed him a beer and now they’re here, slouching together on the couch.

“He offered me a job. COO.”

“Yeah.”

Tom turns his head, resting on the back of the couch, to look at Greg. “Jealous?”

Greg rolls his eyes at that, smiling – the cheek of the guy, honestly – and says “nah, dude, I’m not qualified. Or even really interested, I guess? Like, I don’t need to be the big boss or anything, it sounds like too much work.”

Tom nods, like he gets what Greg’s saying, but really it sounds like bullshit. Because what person in their right mind _wouldn’t_ want to be running a multi-billion dollar company? People would kill for that kind of opportunity, and not just in the metaphorical way that Kendall’s been doing. But hey, whatever. Greg says he’s not jealous, fine. Tom’s happy to let him think that.

“You know,” he says, turning back to the TV and taking a swig of his beer, “I think Kendall thought I was acting strange. He kept looking at me like I’d grown antennae.”

“Well what did you do?”

“What did _I_ do, Greg? Why do you assume I _did_ something, am I that much of a freak?” He sees Greg open his mouth to protest, but waves it off. “I offered him a drink, I made small talk, I don’t know. Said I was settling in here, maybe he just thinks it’s weird for a guy in his – _early_ – forties to have a roommate.”

Which, to be fair, it is. _Tom_ finds it weird and he’s the one who’s doing it.

“Ohh,” Greg says, eyes widening. He looks at Tom, then just as quickly looks away. “Yeah, no, that’s not it.”

They sit there in silence for a few seconds, before Tom realises that Greg isn’t gonna say anything more and decides to prompt him with a “well?”

“He, uh, was asking me about it the other day, actually.” Greg tucks some hair behind his ear, smiles like he’s just heard a mildly funny joke, then once again looks at Tom briefly before looking away. “He thinks we’re fucking?”

Tom’s thoughts are whirling a mile a minute. Kendall thinks they’re _fucking_? He thinks, he genuinely thinks that they’re – god, is that what he thinks Tom and Shiv ended things over? He hasn’t – he hasn’t said anything to _Shiv_ , has he? Is that why he wanted to talk to Tom alone, what, so that he wouldn’t have to see them being all couple-y?

His palms are sweating. The air is starting to feel thinner. Tom blinks. He blinks again, then he laughs, a horrible forced thing that makes his chest hurt. He pretends to wipe a tear from his eye. “You told him we weren’t, right?” he asks, still forcing that laugh like it’s all some big fucking joke. “God, wouldn’t that just be the most fucked up Greek tragedy bullshit you ever heard in your life.”

Greg doesn’t say anything. He puts his beer bottle down on the floor, hunches over and starts twiddling his fingers.

It’s getting harder to fake being amused. Tom lets his face fall, staring at Greg. “Wouldn’t it, Greg,” he asks, tone flat.

“I just think –” Greg sighs and looks up at Tom. “Would it really be the worst thing in the world? If we were?”

Yes, it would. Tom doesn’t sleep with men, for starters. Well, not anymore. Not for a long time, not since before he moved to New York. And if he _did_ still sleep with men, Greg would be way down at the bottom of his to-do list, so to speak. He’s too – _Greg_. He’s not tall how Tom is tall, he’s tall like he was a regular sized guy that got stretched out. He acts and talks like he’s confused in every encounter he has, he’s expressed a remarkable capability for stabbing Tom in the back, and for god’s sake, he’s Shiv’s _cousin_. Her _fucking_ cousin.

He doesn’t say any of that to Greg – _and his eyes are too big, anyway, it’s weird_ – he just puts on his sweet ‘if this were any other situation I’d be ripping you apart’ voice, and asks “are you drunk again?”

“No,” Greg replies, staring off into the distance. Tom can tell the exact moment it clicks what he’s said, though, because he practically jumps out of his skin, turning to look frantically at Tom. It’s also, coincidentally, the moment that _Tom_ realises what he’s said. “What – _again_? Again, Tom? You – you _remember_?”

Oh, well, might as well face the music. “Of course I _remember_ , Greg,” he sneers, “nobody _actually_ gets blackout drunk, that’s not a real thing!”

Greg leaps out of his seat, takes a step or two away from Tom, then spins on his heel, glaring. “You asshole! How long were you gonna keep that one to your chest, huh, you’re such a – you’re such a fucking coward! You, what, you can’t even say, like, ‘oh, sorry Greg, I just don’t feel the same’?”

“Oh, as if you ever said anything about _feelings_ , you idiot.” Tom stands up too, steps towards Greg so that they’re almost chest to chest. “You go on about my wife – my _wife_ , Greg, the love of my fucking life – and how I shouldn’t have married her as what, huh? As a way of pitching _yourself_? Please.”

Greg’s eyes are locked on his, darting around like they’re looking for something. “Unless you do,” he mutters.

“What.”

“All you had to say was no.”

Tom’s heart is pounding, so hard he can feel it in his ears.

“You didn’t say no,” Greg continues, and then of their own free will Tom’s hands reach up and grab the sides of his face, pulling him down and smashing their mouths together.

Fuck.

Greg’s hands flail for a second before coming to rest on Tom’s hips, his fingers curling into the fabric of his clothes. For a moment it feels like he’s pulling away, but then he surges forwards, the force of it making Tom feel like the only thing keeping him from falling over is Greg’s steady weight, grounding him.

Fucking, shitting goddamned _fuck_.

This is the biggest fucking mistake Tom’s made in his life.

It’s not enough.

He lets his teeth graze Greg’s bottom lip, snakes a hand around to tangle into his hair, tugging at it. Greg moans in response, low and needy and it lights a fire in the pit of Tom’s stomach, warmth spreading right through him.

Suddenly Greg’s hands are no longer on his hips, instead they’re creeping up his torso and jesus, that’s hot, but then they reach his chest and Greg shoves, hard, and Tom stumbles back.

He lands back on the couch staring up at Greg, breath ragged. Greg’s eyes are dark, his hair’s a mess, his lips are swollen. He’s breathing heavy too, chest moving up and down as he stares at Tom.

If this is it, if Tom’s fucked up their friendship forever, he wants to always remember Greg looking like this.

“Greg, I –”

“Shut up,” Greg says, and clambers onto his lap, straddling his hips.

He presses one hand into Tom’s chest, keeping him pushed back into the cushions of the couch. The other hand cradles his jaw as Greg kisses him furiously, grinding his hips against Tom’s as he does.

Tom isn’t thinking of much beyond Greg, and the feeling of Greg’s body against his, but he at least has enough faculties left to think: _more_. He starts fumbling at Greg’s belt buckle – since when did they make the damn things so complicated – and then at the zipper on his slacks, desperate just to _touch_ , to savour as much of this as he possibly can.

Greg pulls his mouth away and Tom definitely does _not_ whine in disappointment, but he only moves an inch, resting their foreheads together. He’s smiling, eyes lit up like Tom’s some kind of – some kind of _prize_ he’s won at a fair, and his thumb is absently stroking Tom’s cheek.

“Bedroom?”

That, Tom’s brain starts screaming at him, is the point of no return. That’s real, that’s _deliberate_ , and it’s the stupidest thing he could possibly do. But dear god, he wants it. Fuck. “Yes,” he breathes, leaning forwards to catch Greg’s lips again.

*

Tom wakes up in a bedroom washed in pale blue light, the sky outside hazy and the city looking very nearly asleep. The closest New York can get to sleep, anyway. The clock on the bedside table, a small cheap digital thing, reads 4:15am. There’s an arm draped over his waist and a head on his shoulder, and the warm weight of the dog lying next to his legs.

 _Fuck_.

Without thinking, he reaches up and strokes his fingers through Greg’s hair. It’s soft and clean and just long enough that Tom can curl a piece around his finger, something that Shiv never used to let him do over claims that it tickled, or something.

They’re thankfully both in t-shirts and boxers, having showered together after – well, after, and Tom was wearing some of Greg’s (cotton, ugh) because he’d been too tired to do much other than shuffle to the bedroom door, open it so Mondale could find him, and collapse back into bed.

He’s pretty sure the mattress is Ikea or something just as middle-class, it feels like it’s maybe _trying_ to be memory foam without providing the kind of sleeping on a cloud, melt all your aches and pains away kind of comfort that Tom is used to, and the sheets are soft but still just not quite _right_.

But he’s warm, and comfortable, and he feels more relaxed than he has in months which is probably why his pulse starts quickening, why the room starts to spin. Holy fucking shit, he has to get out of here.

He tries to breathe as he carefully lifts Greg’s arm off him, shuffles his shoulder away until Greg’s head drops onto an actual pillow, and then he gets out of bed and rushes as quietly as he can out the room and into his own bedroom.

Tom has an armchair in the corner of his room which he sits down on, elbows on his knees and face buried in his hands. He tries to breathe, tries to remember to count to three with each breath in until he no longer feels like he’s dying, and then he gets up, wipes his damp face roughly with a towel, and goes to change into his running clothes.

It’s too early, really, even for Tom who prefers to run when the streets are as empty as possible, but he still pulls on his running shoes, hooks Mondale up to his lead, and leaves.

He runs for over an hour, all the way up to Central Park and then back along the river, only stopping once when Mondale needs some water. He tries not to think of anything but the sound of his feet pounding on the pavement, but it’s that old conundrum of ‘trying not to think about something makes you think about it even more’, and his head is filled with flashes of Greg’s hands, Greg’s lips, Greg’s – _stop._

It’s not quite six when he gets back to Tribeca, so nothing’s open yet. Not even the Starbucks, which means Tom can’t go sit and nurse a coffee for an hour, can’t do anything to put off what he’s dreading most: going home.

Still, he’s gonna have to face it eventually. Best to rip the band aid off. He wanders over to the apartment, stands in the elevator having to almost physically restrain himself from pressing the emergency stop button, then he gets to the door, turns his key in the lock, and walks in.

The lights aren’t on, there’s just the orange light from the sunrise streaming in through the huge windows, but Greg is up, sitting hunched over the kitchen counter.

He looks up as the door swings shut and just stares at Tom, blinking. Mondale trots over and sniffs his leg curiously, but he doesn’t look down, doesn’t smile and scratch his head like he usually would. And jesus fucking christ, Tom thinks, he looks distraught. His eyes are red-rimmed, eyelashes clumping together, and his skin is pale and blotchy.

“Hi,” Tom says, because fuck, what else can he say?

This is his fault. This is so obviously his fault, and Greg is hurting and it’s _his fault_ , and maybe he shouldn’t have come back. Maybe it would’ve been easier that way.

“I –” Greg starts, voice wobbling, “I thought you’d left. Again.”

Tom’s chest clenches.

This is the point of no return, he thinks again. He could make a joke, say something insulting, and they could pass last night off as a stupid one-time thing. As – as a mistake fuelled by all their built up stress and adrenaline. All he has to do is make a joke.

“No,” he says, softly. He tries for a smile, the corner of his mouth twitching up just slightly. “No, buddy, I’m right here.”

“ _Fuck_ ,” Greg says. He puts his face back in his hands. “Mondale climbed over me to get off the bed and it woke me up, but you weren’t there and then, like, I heard the door closing and you hadn’t said anything or left a note or a text and your find my friends wasn’t on and I – I thought I’d fucked it. I thought, y’know, like, ‘he’s really not coming back this time’, but now you _are_ back and I – _fuck_ , man.”

When he’s done, Greg looks back up at Tom and goddammit, he’s crying again, silent tears tracking down his cheeks.

Tom wants to tease him. He wants to go over there, wrap him up in his arms and wipe the tears off of his stupid face, calling him a dumb girl while he does.

He holds himself back, stays where he’s standing, and says “I went for a run,” instead. “Needed to clear my head.”

“Right.” Greg nods. “Sure, yeah.”

“I don’t…” he starts, then shakes his head. “I don’t know what came over me, last night. I think I should apologise. This –” and at this, he waves a hand at Greg’s general state of despair, “is all my fault.”

“No,” Greg sniffs, “this is just me overreacting, y’know. Dumb Greg and his fucking – his ‘feelings’, ha.” He smiles, rolls his eyes like he’s just heard a stupid joke. “But it was good, right? That’s not just me? It was _good_.”

“Yeah.” Tom chuckles, wipes a hand down his face. “It was really fucking good.”

“You didn’t have to leave, this morning.”

“I –” He what, exactly? He forgot how to breathe. He felt like the walls were closing in. He thought he was having a heart attack. “I panicked.”

“Yeah, I know,” Greg says. _I know you_. “You do that a lot.”

Tom smiles, soft and tender and not like him at all, what is _happening_ to him? “Guess I do,” he murmurs.

He shoves his hands in his pockets and just stands there for a few moments, watching Greg. He’s starting to look better, less meltdown-y.

“Greg, is this,” he starts again, slowly and carefully. “Is this, like, an objectively terrible thing that we’ve done? Are we bad people?”

“I don’t know. But I think, like, of all the things we’ve done that _do_ make us bad people, um. I think maybe this isn’t one of them.”

The thing about Greg, the thing that’s always bugged Tom, is that he expects so little. He expects so little but he _wants_ so loudly, and then he acts surprised when people actually notice that and do something nice for him, a gift or a favour. But that’s the thing, is that he _is_ always surprised because Greg Hirsch would never dare actually ask for what he wants.

What he wants right now is Tom. Is it cocky to think that? That what he’s wanted for a while, maybe, is Tom, but for once he’s kept it so well hidden under a million other layers of pointless shit that only now, looking at his face glowing in the sunrise, does Tom see it.

Tom had never even thought about it, before yesterday. God, he’s such a fucking asshole. But now, now he can’t _stop_ thinking about it and fuck, his heart is starting to pound again.

He watches Greg. He watches Greg watching him.

“You don’t wanna be with me.”

“Right,” Greg says, nods like Tom’s made a good point ( _fight me, goddammit)_. “But, like, I do though?”

“The thing about me, Greg,” he says, “is that I’m a terrible prick.” _Would you kiss me? If I asked you to?_

Greg smirks, eyes lighting up. “You are. I don’t care, though.”

“We could pretend this never happened. Go back to how things were, it’d be easier. Less messy.”

“We could.”

They could. Tom wouldn’t be able to stay, of course, he’d have to find an apartment. He’s been staying with Greg nearly a month and he hadn’t even _started_ to look, what the fuck was he thinking? Nothing would change with work, Kendall would still bring him in, he doesn’t need to know. He probably wouldn’t care, if he _did_ know. Tom and Greg could be colleagues, then maybe in a year or so they can go for drinks, laugh about this, and go back to being friends. It would be easier.

And it wouldn’t make sense, anyway. The two of them. Maybe you can fuck someone you live with but you can’t _date_ them, no budding relationship could withstand being around someone so constantly. Greg might have this all figured out but Tom has no idea _what_ he’s feeling, and he’s just got a divorce, dammit, this could just be a rebound, this could just be something he needs to get out of his system. And then if he _does_ get it out of his system, Greg’s still there. Greg still wants him, and then what? He has to break his heart?

And god, what if he _doesn’t_ get it out of his system, what if this is it for him, what if he’s fucked? He’d have to tell his parents. He’d have to tell Kendall, god, he’d probably have to tell _Shiv_. He’d be ruined.

He’s still staring at Greg.

“For fuck’s sake Tom,” Greg snaps, pulling him out of his thoughts, “would you just come over here and kiss me, already.”

Fuck it. Fuck all of it.

He strides over and wraps his arms around Greg's neck – and oh, with Greg sitting down he’s taller than him and that feels fucking _amazing_ – and he leans down and kisses him like there’s not a single thing he’d rather be doing and maybe there’s _not_ , maybe he should just quit business and do this for the rest of his life.

“So, like,” Greg mutters between kisses, “we’re not forgetting?”

“No,” Tom says, “we are not. Fucking. _Forgetting_.”

“Thank – mmph - thank fuck for that.”

**Author's Note:**

>   
>  *slaps own fic* this bad boy can fit some many random references into it.  
>   
> honestly I have no idea what this is, like I said before it kinda got away from me, but I hope you enjoyed anyway!  
> please leave comments and kudos, and come chat to me on my [tumblr](https://superangsty.tumblr.com/)!


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